All,

I've now logged a few blissful hours of flight on my Blade Scout CX. I know that the next step should be mastering a 4-ch heli. But aside from being somewhat lazy and interested strictly in indoor flight, I'm in a bit of a dilemma about making the jump.

Here's the deal: Roughly a year ago, I did briefly have an mCX2. I was quite fond of this bird and was just starting to get the hang of Mode 2 flying, when it had a meltdown and the airframe warped, so I ended up junking it (very likely this was my fault. It was my first experience with a hobby-grade heli. Got over-enthusiastic, started rotating multiple batteries without giving the motors a proper cool-down but I digress...)

Anyways, here's my concern: One thing that's especially addictive about the Scout is the hover. The Tx has of course only throttle on the left stick. It's not spring-loaded and has a great silky smooth feel to it, so maintaining a consistent hover is nearly effortless.

In contrast, my memories of the mCX2 Tx are that since the rudder (spring-loaded) and throttle were both on the left stick, this made it relatively difficult to keep a steady hover when applying rudder at the same time.

OTOH I'm quite aware of the fact that with no aileron control on the Scout, it's difficult to completely avoid some side drift. The only option here is to try and adjust it out by turning the aileron link that's attached to the airframe one or two turns, which is a relative PITA (pull off canopy, pull link off swash-plate ball, turn once or twice, put back on swash-plate, put canopy back on, test and repeat if necessary) whereas with the mCX2 there's full aileron control plus trim, making the issue moot.

So on the surface, the dilemma seems to be: Scout = more precise hover, but less precise directional control... mCX2 = less precise hover, but greater precision with directional flight. And of course the overall learning curve.

Are there any Tx out there that somehow mitigates the throttle+rudder issue with perhaps a different feel (and hopefully not costing a gazillion bucks) or am I making too much of this? Is it just the nature of the beast, and is it possible to learn to get a stable hover when using any Mode 2 Tx ?

You are making too much of it. You don't like it because it takes you out of your comfort zone. Mode 2 is easy to adjust to. It's the most common because it's the most natural.